Literary adaptations can have a reputation for being stuffy, but James McTeigue‘s The Raven looks anything but. The story, which is not based on legendary writer Edgar Allan Poe‘s poem of the same title, revolves around Poe (John Cusack) as he gets pulled into a serial killer case when a young Baltimore detective (Luke Evans) realizes that the murderer has modeled his crimes after Poe’s works. (Like a 19th-century Castle, I guess.) McTeigue is the director behind such visually striking actioners as V for Vendetta and Ninja Assassin, and The Raven looks to be along those same lines. Watch the trailer after the jump.

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Update: Two more images were released over the weekend, and you can see them in the gallery below.

We’ve seen another shot or two, semi-official and not at all official, of John Cusack in costume as Edgar Allan Poe in James McTeigue‘s film The Raven. Now this is the first for-real official shot of the character, and the only downside is that it looks like the other shots.

Still, The Raven has settled on a March 9, 2012 release date (and evidently decided to keep the titleThe Raven), and I’m very interested to see more from the movie in which Poe ends up looking for a killer whose methods seem tied to the author’s work. We’ll see some footage at Comic Con when Relativity presents the film in Hall H on Friday July 22, but for now you can see the full image after the break. Read More »

A couple quick updates on James McTeigue‘s The Raven today: The Edgar Allan Poe thriller, starring John Cusack as Poe, has lost its title, and is currently being referred to by the working title The Untitled Raven Project. On the plus side, the film now has an official release date of March 9, 2012. Read more about the project after the jump.

Before Daniel Day-Lewis gets his chance to don the beard and top hat, 20th Century Fox will have Honest Abe wielding axes and decapitating vampires. In October, the studio bought the rights to Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter with a script by Seth Grahame-Smith, based on his novel, to be directed in 3D by Timur Bekmambetov and produced by Tim Burton. A release date of June 22, 2012 has already been set, so the focus of the filmmakers has recently on casting their lead.

Deadline is now reporting that an eclectic mix of actors will soon test for the role. They are Benjamin Walker, James D’Arcy, Adrien Brody, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Josh Lucas, and Timothy Olyphant. We break them down, as well as the project, after the jump. Read More »

Faster has a hell of an opening. Dwayne Johnson — imposing, singularly determined and looking like The Rock for the first time in quite a while — is released from prison. On foot, he trucks over to an auto scrap yard containing a shrouded Chevelle. As the car is revealed, the song ‘Goodbye My Friend‘ by the De Angelis Brothers kicks in. The man, the car and this theme from a ’74 Italian police thriller called Street Law make as good a statement of purpose as any. The suggestion is that Faster will be a movie that plays like The Rock looks: muscular, mean and single-minded.

If only that were true. While the Rock cuts an impressive figure as a violent anti-hero, the movie around him is as misconceived as they come. There aren’t enough auto wreck metaphors to get across how thoroughly Faster demolishes a simple revenge movie premise. Read More »

We’ve seen two trailers for Faster, the action/revenge film starring Dwayne Johnson. One was a teaser and the other a red-band that many people complained showed way too much. (I didn’t watch it, but since I haven’t yet seen the film I couldn’t vouch for that accusation.)

This is the first proper theatrical trailer, however, so it gives up more of the story that sees Dwayne Johnson trying to avenge the killing of his brother, which puts him in opposition to a cop played by Billy Bob Thornton and a mysterious woman, played by Maggie Grace. Read More »

CBS Films has released a new Red Band movie trailer from their upcoming action film Faster. The George Tillman Jr.-directed revenge thriller stars Dwayne Johnson as“an ex-con pursued by cops and killers as he sets out to avenge his brother’s death.” Looks like your typical revenge action thriller, but I enjoy The Rock when it isn’t a kid’s film and I’ll see anything that has Clint Mansell’s score.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer now. And please leave your thoughts in the comments below!Read More »